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The Netflix Thread

Just got this email:

We want to let you know about two important changes to the Netflix service.

1. The price of your current plan is changing from $8.99 a month to $9.99 a month. This new price will be effective with your next billing statement on or after January 2, 2011, and will be referenced in your Membership Details. With your current plan you can both instantly watch unlimited TV episodes and movies on your computer or TV and receive unlimited DVDs by mail.

2. We now also offer a new $7.99 a month plan which lets you instantly watch unlimited TV episodes and movies on your computer or TV. This plan does not include any DVDs. All the titles you can watch instantly on your current plan are also available on this new plan, and as a reminder, not all titles on DVD are available to watch instantly. This new plan is available immediately – if you'd like to switch to this new plan at any time, simply visit Your Account.

Why the changes? Our selection of TV episodes and movies available to stream has grown dramatically, and as a result most members want us to deliver unlimited movies and TV episodes two ways: streaming instantly over the internet plus DVDs by mail. The price change will allow us to continue to offer the popular plan choice of unlimited TV episodes and movies streaming instantly along with unlimited DVDs. The new plan, which does not include DVDs, is a great option for the increasing number of members who only want to watch instantly. The $7.99 a month price reflects no DVD shipping costs on this plan.

We hope you're enjoying great TV shows and movies from Netflix, and that you'll continue to enjoy Netflix on whichever plan you choose. We realize you have lots of home entertainment options, and we thank you for your business. As always, if you have any questions, please call us at 1-800-715-2146.

Not sure about good or bad, but it was inevitable. Netflix is doing everything they can to get out of the "shipping DVDs" business. Postage is their most significant cost -- hundreds of millions in expenses. They cringe every time they have to mail someone a DVD.

The streaming only plan is probably more akin to subscribing to HBO or Showtime. Limited movie and TV availability. Those are the businesses you should be comparing pricing/content to if you're considering it.

Not sure about good or bad, but it was inevitable. Netflix is doing everything they can to get out of the "shipping DVDs" business. Postage is their most significant cost -- hundreds of millions in expenses. They cringe every time they have to mail someone a DVD.

True. Mara's behavior interests me, though, because it means on some level Netflix might be cannibalizing their own sales.

The only part of streaming-only that troubles me is that the movies & show licenses come and go pretty quickly, and Netflix itself doesn't give you much of a warning about this.

but my guess is they will go with everything being available on streaming.

Won't ever happen. Other subscription services don't want their movies available for streaming on Netflix. Studios also limit their licenses to Netflix Instant Watch because of the broadcast and basic cable deals they might have in play. There's never going to be significantly more content available to you through Netflix Instant Watch than on, say, HBO. At least for newer movies.

@DavidSeven - Well said. The cable deals hamstring everyone (Netflix, Amazon, iTunes, Hulu) trying to compete in this space. Eventually I figured the studios/cable companies (one in the same?) will try to roll out their own dedicated streaming services, and try to cripple the upstarts they way they crippled TiVo.

Won't ever happen. Other subscription services don't want their movies available for streaming on Netflix. Studios also limit their licenses to Netflix Instant Watch because of the broadcast and basic cable deals they might have in play. There's never going to be significantly more content available to you through Netflix Instant Watch than on, say, HBO. At least for newer movies.

Anyway, the selection for older stuff is limited on Instant Watch too. Seems the extra couple bucks would be worth being able to see whatever you wanted. I'm on the two-at-a-time plan myself even though I haven't gotten a disc in ages. I'll probably convert to one-at-a-time + streaming.

Anyway, the selection for older stuff is limited on Instant Watch too. Seems the extra couple bucks would be worth being able to see whatever you wanted. I'm on the two-at-a-time plan myself even though I haven't gotten a disc in ages. I'll probably convert to one-at-a-time + streaming.

Yeah I agree that the lack of old content on instant watch is fairly lame, but hopefully that will change with time as licensing is probably less of an issue there.

I was actually just reading about Matt Damon and he’s like, ‘There’s a culture of outrage.’ I’m like, ‘Well, they have a reason to be outraged.’ I think it’s a lot of dudes just being scared. They’re like, ‘What if I did something and I didn’t realize it?’ I’m like, ‘Deal with it.’